Around Town
Starter
Welcome to the 'Around Town' week!
This week we will be exploring all our favourite spots around town and do fun and exciting activities in each place.
Today we will be starting with looking at our own town- but hang on a second, lets start from the beginning. Where do we live again? Which country do we live in? This would be a great moment to take out a world map/ google maps or globe and point out your country to your kids. Zoom in and show them your city. What's the name of our city? Who do we know that also lives next to us in our city? What are our favourite places to go to in our city? Today we are going to focus on understanding a little more about what our city has to offer!
Day
1
Welcome to...
OUR TOWN
Choose 2-3 20-30 minute activities from the options below:
Guessing Game
After you make your map, physical city, play a guessing game about where you would go to do specific things. For example, where do we go to buy milk? Where do we go to borrow books? Your kids can point to the buildings that they have drawn and coloured in on the map/ mural/ boxes.
City Map
This activity is aimed to tap into your kids' imagination and creativity. They have the chance to design and build either the city that you live in, or an imaginary one.
1. Start off by giving your kids a big piece of cardboard (think old cereal boxes stuck together, old boxes from a supermarket delivery that have been flattened) or a massive piece of paper (you can stick a few A4 pieces together.
2. Ask your kids to brainstorm the most important places in your city and write them down 3. Now its time to draw the design of your city. Are the streets grid like, or curvy? Are there lots of culdersacks in your neighbourhood?
3. Now that the streets are drawn, its time to get busy with the buildings and details. This would be an awesome time to use any lego people, or figurines you have lying around for props. For the houses, you can build them with lego/ dupplo, make them out of small pieces of cardboard and have the kids colour/ paint them. You can also cut out pictures from magazines and stick them on, or print pictures of your city's famous attractions from google. Its up to your kids and their imagination! If your children decided to invent their city, dont forget to name it and write where its located!
Shoebox and Milk Carton Town
Gather all the shoeboxes and empty milk boxes around your house. Cover them in white paper and draw the outlines of buildings, shops and houses in your town on the boxes. You can take a bit of time to colour in the pictures with markers, stick feathers, glitter, cardboard or whatever other arts and crafty type things you have around the house. Bonus if you print photos from google of various attractions in your city and stick them onto the boxes. Make sure to give the building names so you know what's what!
Street Mural
Choose your favourite street in your city. Stick butcher paper/ cardboard onto a wall and draw the houses/ shops of the street on the paper. Have your kids colour in the buildings with markers or even paint!
Indoor Active
Your Town Comes To Life!
Choose 3-5 attractions in your town and build them using furniture and toys in your living room. Build a street that connects these attractions using a long blanket that you can weave in between the sites. Once finished, have races with your kids to see who can reach a certain attraction first, or simply take a nice stroll through your newly built town and admire the sites/ your handiwork.
Outdoor Active
An Obstacle Course Around Town!
Construct an obstacle course around your outdoor area, that includes imaginary buildings and key places in your town. For example, the supermarket, bakery, town hall, cinema, mall etc.
Have your kids race through the obstacle by foot or with their scooters/ toy cars. You can choose to time them or simply cheer them on as they go!
Social
Screen Time
Learn a little more about the places we go in our city-